


Idiots

by ReluctantlyGreyhound



Category: Firefly
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Episode: s01e06 Our Mrs. Reynolds, F/M, Pining, inara's pov, it gets me every damn time, that fucking ending scene i really can't
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-02
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-10-02 20:26:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,042
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17270570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReluctantlyGreyhound/pseuds/ReluctantlyGreyhound
Summary: Inara's thoughts during and right after the ending scene of Our Mrs. Reynolds.





	Idiots

**Author's Note:**

> My feels hate me for loving this episode but it's all chill. Apologies if this reads like Mal bashing; I swear I love him with all my heart, but Inara's feelings on the matter are much more complicated :P

“How's about we don't play. You didn't just trip, did you?”

A frozen beat of silence.

“No.”

He’s standing close to her, their hearts thrumming together. A big grin spreads over Mal’s face, but she can tell that he’s just as nervous as her.

Or maybe not. Honestly, who knows with him. 

And that right there is the most infuriating thing about this deeply infuriating man. She can read anyone,  _everyone_... but not him. Never him.

“Isn’t that something,” he drawls. Her heart thuds painfully and she takes a soft breath.

This is it, then. They’re really not playing anymore. He’s finally figured it out. 

_Who’d have thought it possible_ , the cruelest part of her brain thinks.

They’re actually going to talk about it like civilized humans, and the words will be out in the open. Unable to be taken back. Tangibly there between them. 

_The 'verse must be ending_ , her brain keeps going snidely.

They’ve been dancing around it ever since she met him, and sometimes she doesn’t know how she’ll be able to stand it. But those times are when she ruthlessly forces her feelings down, because she knows what he thinks of her.

Whore.

They may be friends. He may like her. He may even love her at times (again, she honestly can’t tell), but he sure as hell doesn’t respect her and he never will. She might give her body to men like that, but she will never ever give her heart away so easily.

_Well, too late, but he doesn’t need to know that._

His grin grows bigger. The  _hún_ _dàn_  can tell that she’s uncomfortable and she just knows he likes it. He pauses a few more seconds for dramatic effect and then smirks. 

“I knew you let her kiss you.”

Oh.

_Tā mā de_. 

Of course.

Of course that’s where his stupid, stupid,  _stupid_ , brain went. 

She should’ve known better.

_Men_.

He swaggers away; so satisfied with himself and his shriveled mind and his small, petty wit. 

She wants to scream and throw her entire incense burner at his back. She wants to scramble into her pilot seat and fly her shuttle away from this dump of a ship forever. She wants to cry and sob and finally,  _finally_  just let all her emotions out. 

Only now does she realize how much she was hoping she’d be able to let them out, no matter how painful it might’ve been.

She sinks to the floor and stifles a gasp. But she chokes on the air, and then the lump in her throat, and then the tears that want to follow right after. She doesn’t even let them pool.

_What an idiot_ , her ever-helpful brain supplies, and she naturally assumes it’s referring to Mal. The more she keeps returning to that thought, though, she realizes that she could just as easily be talking about herself.

What idiots they both are. She knows Mal wants to fuck her, at the very least, and the flashes of something that could be called warmth she occasionally sees in his eyes might mean his feelings for her run deeper. That makes him an idiot for the way he treats her. He always backs down, he never commits, he insults her honor all the time....

But if he’s an idiot, so is she. Maybe even worse. She loves him; she won’t lie to herself, at least. So, naturally, she’ll stand on the sidelines of his life and snipe and bitch back at him and never let him know either.

Maybe they’re proud, or maybe they’re just broken. It doesn’t matter, not in the end. 

What they are for sure are two idiots who don’t know how to deal with emotion, and she really should know better: her job is mostly just playing people’s emotions. That infuriating man and his infuriating cipher of facial expressions defeats her every time, though, even as she defeats him. 

Or so she suspects. Maybe his shoulders were slumping as she left her shuttle? Now that she thinks about it, he didn’t look half as confident as she thought at first. 

_Love makes us all idiots_ ,  _as you yourself see all the time_ , she tries to console herself with, but comparing herself those sad, lonely men who propose to her in their desperation doesn’t help in the slightest.

The fact that Mal hasn’t tried that yet says something. Something that gives her hope despite how difficult he is. 

Perhaps that’s how he respects her.

_He’s still an idiot, though. Saffron,_ _that_ shǎ bī _, got through to him easily enough_ , she thinks bitterly. Mal kissed her, his sweet little Mrs. Reynolds, and damn if that doesn’t make her blood boil. He got what he deserved pretty quickly, but it doesn’t erase the fact that Saffron got more from him than she ever has.

But it’s unsurprising. Saffron was using him, and she clearly wasn’t dealing with emotions, which (funnily enough) makes it all easier. She also had straight motivation in the form of cold, hard cash, and even Inara knows that can make you do things you’d be nervous about; not that she thinks Saffron was nervous about seducing him in the slightest. Not her.

_And you shouldn’t be either, trained Companion that you are. Idiot._

She imagines herself in Saffron’s position. The apathy she’d feel towards Mal if he was just a target does make everything much easier, but when she tries to picture herself acting as Mrs. Reynolds, she can’t help but snort inelegantly.

She sighs and collects herself up off the floor, only to sink down on her couch. It’s not the first time Mal has disappointed her, but she supposes that this time is different because she really thought that he’d say... something. She’s not sure what exactly she expected him to say, but for a second, she could have sworn it felt like everything was about to change.

She gets up to make herself a cup of tea. It’s the only thing to do. Mal will always be Mal, and he'll always be able to play with her heart like that, so why dwell on it.

Needless to say, she dwells on it for the entire day (and night, and into the next day).

**Author's Note:**

> Chinese definitions:
> 
> Hún dàn - Bastard (lit. mixed egg)
> 
> Tā mā de - Fuck (lit. his mother's)
> 
> Shǎ bī - Cunt (lit. stupid vagina)


End file.
